About Cameron

Cameron L. Martindell is a freelance adventure and expedition writer and photographer who is always “Off Yonder: Seeing the world for what it is.” In addition to writing his own popular blog, he has written for Snowshoeing Magazine, Mountainzone.com, UK Travel Mag, Trekker Magazine and others. He has been to all seven continents and lived on five of them, including a four-month stint at the South Pole. Cameron has more than 15 years of mountain search and rescue experience, is an Eagle Scout, has been an Australian bush firefighter, competes in sailing regattas, plans national and international youth programs, guides Oregon rafting trips and Australian bush backpacking trips, the list goes on . . . really.

Mt. Baker, Washington, United States

22 August 2016

Like || Tweet || More Photos || Purchase Photo

When I got the invite to go back to the Pacific Northwest and climb Mt. Baker, I was ecstatic. I’ve done a bit of mountaineering in the northern Cascades and have played on the slopes of Mt. Baker in the past but had never been to the top. The trip was with MSR to check out their spring 2017 product line including a number of new tents, cooking utensils, water filtration and stoves. It was the perfect setting.

Mt. Sneffels, San Juan Mountains, Colorado

21 May 2016

After missing one of Colorado’s better ski seasons this winter, I returned from Finland to receive an invite to head to the SW corner of the state, where the snow is nearly always abundant, for a spring ski trip. It’s a long drive, but it’s usually totally worth it.

Finland

1 March 2016

I love to travel, but I really love to travel for long perids and to have a strong education component mixed in. Here’s a quick recap of a program I got hired to help with taking 20 Principia College students to Finland for about two months. They were mostly education students and the abroad focused on the Finnish Education system as well as their sustainability efforts. We traveled nearly the whole length of Finland and spent a good amount of time in the Arctic. It was a dream come true.

Whitetail Peak, Beartooth Range, Red Lodge, Montana, United States

31 August 2015

Not ten minutes into the trail and suddenly we were forced to retreat into our rain coats. Then, to further impede our progress, lightning flash and thunder strikes right over our heads pushed us to find some shelter amongst the sparse clumps of standing trees. In 2008, the human ignited Cascade fire ripped through here burning over 10,000 acres. Charred bits still peak through the foliage that has since grown back and we have plenty of time to ponder the lightning over our head and the fire it can cause as we wait for the storm to pass. Sixty percent of the fires in the Beartooths are caused by lightning strike.

Bella Coola, Canada

17 August 2015

While I spent most of my teen years in the Pacific Northwest, my only real foray into British Columbia was up to Vancouver, Victoria and Whistler a few times. This time, I got to go a little further north. About half way between Washington State and Alaska lies the beautiful Bella Coola Valley. It’s at the end of a 70-mile fjord and the mountains continue to climb from there.

Bermuda

15 April 2015

I’m not much of a beach person. Sure, I beach bummed it a bit in San Diego before moving to Colorado, but I was never passionate about the beach. But Bermuda was different. Instead of just lounging around we had a lot of fun exploring the island in some creative and fun ways.

Guinn/Arestua Hut, Roosevelt National Forest, Eldora, Colorado, United States

4 January 2015

This was a great day trip out to Guinn Hut. We got a few turns in on our way down to Yankee Doodle Lake then skied out. The snow was amazing and the company was a fun bunch of folks organized by Dave.
Here’s hoping I’m establishing an obtainable new years resolution by trying to get images and video posted more quickly after getting back from a trip.

Shout out:

Vail, Colorado, United States

25 August 2014

I’ve been having a bunch of fun making Instagram videos of late. I would say “quick” Instagram videos, but I don’t always turn them around as fast as I’d like. After the GoPro Mountain Games in Vail I had a bunch of footage after competing in three different events. We started the day paddling down Gore Creek. I managed to get a video of that published shortly after the weekend, but not the videos of the Bad Ass Dash obstacle course or the XC Mountain Bike race. Finally, those are done and if you didn’t catch them on Instagram, I’ve compiled the three into a YouTube video here:

Shout out:

Jackson Hole, Wyoming, United States

14 March 2014

I’m far from being an expert skier, despite skiing expert runs at ski areas. I’m at that point in my skiing where it takes a lot of time on the snow to see much in the way of improvement. Fortunately, I got to see, rather, experience, the fruits of my efforts over the past few years since moving to Colorado. While I was still the weakest skier in the group of outdoor and primarily ski journalists on this trip to Jackson Hole I was able to keep up and even enjoy myself.

The trip was organized and sponsored by Marmot with some help with Polartec. Marmot was using Polartec’s new breathable insulation technology called Alpha. The idea is to be able to be working hard in the winter and dump the excess heat your body creates to avoid overheating and sweating which can be a problem once your body starts to cool off. On the other hand, as you do cool you want your layers to be right to keep you warm enough. Usually this involves stripping and adding layers as you change your activity on the mountain. I’ve been using an Eddy Bauer jacket with Polartec Alpha most of this season and it has been great. The Marmot kit did really well though it could have been colder out to optimize the feature of the technology.